


You Push It In (And You Cut Me Down)

by Denzer



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-21
Updated: 2020-06-21
Packaged: 2021-03-03 23:37:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,326
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24840142
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Denzer/pseuds/Denzer
Summary: Rey no longer has any concept of her own position as her ship hovers above the pressure lip. She has no idea where the nearest assailant TIE is. She can't even hear the whoops that come over the commlink as Kylo Ren falls. She is watching him struggle against the yokes, vibrating in his black-gloved hands. The heat of his cockpit floor is seeping through her boots and pricking at her soles. She is watching in horror as his ship plummets toward the surface.My attempt at high-octane adventure based on SymmetryLocked's prompt for Reylo Jukebox Exchange - Go To War by Nothing More. This song was new to my and I loved it from the second I heard it so many thanks for the addition to my playlist.I hope you like the story!
Relationships: Rey & Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 28
Kudos: 62
Collections: Reylo Jukebox Exchange





	You Push It In (And You Cut Me Down)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [SymmetryLocked](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SymmetryLocked/gifts).



Rey dives through strafing fire and hooks the tip of her X-wing into Excarga's thick atmospheric rim. She knows she has enough velocity to pull up into the black, even as the lower gun-shaft blazes red and bends back on itself under the pressure. She uses the drag as ballast so she can slingshot her ship to face his, before his sights can fix on her.

  
  


The sleek craft that's been trailing her for half the battle rears back to avoid a target lock. Its base reefs through the density of the sub-stratosphere with a shudder she can feel in her bones.

  
  


His teeth must be chattering from the strain right now. His wrists must be burning.

  
  


There is a deep satisfaction in this. Rey, a nobody, has managed to outmaneuver the son of the galaxy's most infamous pilot.

  
  


He is struggling to pull out.

  
  


Rey's vindication lasts exactly 1.5 standard seconds. That's how long it takes for his shields to sputter. For that telltale white-hot crescent to burn red and dissipate until the floor of his cockpit turns a blinding orange and she can feel his controlled panic echoing in that forbidden part of her mind that holds him tight.

  
  


The entire arc of one solid black wing catches and tears, melting away like blue butter on a tongue. His ship spirals. Rey watches in slow motion as it spins on itself, the force of its curvature pulling the remaining wing away like an afterthought. The cockpit rolls, tumbling at a sickening pace over itself and down, down, sucked into the wake of the planet.

  
  


He's here.

  
  


Or

  
  


She's there, seated just behind his shoulder. The acrid tang of heated durasteel burns the back of her throat and her eyes sting with electrical smoke.

  
  


He is so focused on the controls, on staying conscious long enough to find a safe ejection altitude, that he can't feel her. His head is slammed back against the seat. The G-Force makes his cheekbones jut out. His lips pull back over his teeth and his neck is strained in effort.

  
  


Rey no longer has any concept of her own position as her ship hovers above the pressure lip. She has no idea where the nearest assailant TIE is. She can't even hear the whoops that come over the commlink as Kylo Ren falls. She is watching him struggle against the yokes, vibrating in his black-gloved hands. The heat of his cockpit floor is seeping through her boots and pricking at her soles. She is watching in horror as his ship plummets toward the surface.

  
  


He lets out a clipped growl as he pulls hard to slow his descent. But there is no hope for him now. There _is_ no safe ejection point at this speed. He will die here, burnt up in the atmosphere of an uninhabited planet along with the ship that has spread terror across the galaxy. Because she wanted to prove her point.

  
  


She _has_ a place in this story.

  
  


His eyes flick to hers, hold for a second, return to the controls.

  
  


Rey is not thinking when she reaches out. She drags her fingers over his, helps him pull back, lends him her energy so he can slow the descent. It's overpowering, the presence of his frenzied mind, the force of his energy swamping hers. The feelings that emanate from him confuse her, as they always do.

  
  


He's _glad_.

  
  


“Why?” she asks him in a strained voice. His response is calm, despite his gritted teeth and the chaos around him.

“Because it's you.”

  
  


He's staring at her now and his fingers have relaxed on the yokes. There is a flare of anger that shudders through her stomach, so sudden she is entirely unprepared for it. She roars at him.

  
  


“Ben! Pull!”

He comes back to himself, yanks at the controls with her. But it's no use and they both know it. He takes his hands off the remotes entirely, points them at the floor of the ship and concentrates hard.

  
  


Rey can feel herself spinning, though her X-Wing is perfectly still, an easy target above the planet at the edge of the battlefield. She dips into his mind and sees what his intention is as if it were her own idea. She turns away from him, her back to his, with the pilot seat between them, and directs her hands toward the roof of his cockpit.

  
  


_Focus. Cool the hull. Harden it. Slow the descent. Curb the spin. Almost there, just a little more._

  
  


Rey can’t tell whose thoughts are whose. Their minds are fear-fused and it's not working. Impact is inevitable now. She can almost feel the rush of rocky ground screaming toward them. Spinning back to him, she locks herself around Ben, reaching over his seat to throw her arms across his chest. She makes herself buoyant, a protective film that's impermeable to air, to pressure, to gravity, to force of any kind. The moment the impact-alert warning starts to blare, Ben stops trying. He sits back in the pilot's seat, tips his head so he can watch her, and brings his gloved hands up to rest on her crossed forearms.

  
  


Flames burst from the indicator panels, sparks shower over them, smoke fills the air. None of it touches them. She floats, lifting out of her seat, held in place only by her safety harness.

  
  


Their combined Force-energy rents through the rock at the crash-site before the ship even hits. The collision is buffeted but Ben still jerks from side to side in the seat and ends up bent forward oddly on the roof of her cockpit. There is an odd coolness, a chemical smell in the air and he's lost consciousness. He is bleeding from cuts at his temple and lip. His arm is clearly broken and she is worried about his neck-

  
  


He's gone in a blink, the Bond slipping so fast that her breath sucks in and she has to press her chest to hold in a panicked shout.

  
  


His ship has a tracker, she tells herself, the First Order will find him.

  
  


Above her, the lead Destroyers' remains are listing in open space. The last of the TIE's are fleeing, chased by Blue Squadron. The Resistance has won, and Ben is unconscious somewhere on the planet below.

  
  


Rey nose-dives toward the surface, cutting off the calls over her commlink, disabling her tracker, and cloaking the ship.

  
  


* * * * *

  
  


The air is only barely breathable. It’s cold and Rey feels the pull of a heavier gravity field. Her steps feel sluggish and her saberstaff is heavy across her back, pulling toward the barren rock as she closes in on the wreckage. She can see the bottom of his boots, dangling from the overturned, torn-open ship. The hyperdrive is smoking. She only has minutes.

  
  


Rey scrambles over the shredded durasteel until she is directly beneath him. His eyes are closed, hair falling forward, tiny droplets of his blood landing on her shoulder.

“Ben?”

  
  


He doesn't respond.

  
  


She stretches her hands toward him, using the Force to snap his harness and lower him gently down and away from the debris. When he is settled on the rock floor, she slides her hands over him, running the sides of his face, his arms, his torso and legs, seeking the extent of his injuries. Only one is life-threatening, a broken rib has punctured his lung. His chest inflates as Rey heals it and she moves to his arm, where the bone is visible through the torn black cloth. He comes to as she fixes it but he doesn't open his eyes. There is the sudden spike of his surprise, an instantaneous search for any immediate threat to her, while she focuses on healing him. She is flagging, her Force-energy slipping through her grasp as she stitches his skin together. The remains of the First Order could be standing behind her right now and, not only would she not know it, she wouldn’t be able to defend herself from more than a few blaster-bolts.

  
  


Rey closes the cut at his temple and avoids his eye as she deftly hovers her fingers above the last wound, a deep tear in his lip. He swallows. Rey sees the thought that comes crashing from him, the image of him lifting his head to brush his healed mouth against her hand. Her fingers stiffen instinctively. Before she can pull away, he grasps her wrist, overlapping fingers gripping tighter when she tries to jerk loose. The skin at her pulse point begins to burn and Rey pulls hard to free herself, panic bubbling in her chest. But he won’t let her go.

  
  


“What are you doing?” She spits at him, twisting her hand, but he’s too strong, holding her like a vice.

  
  


Outraged, she glares at him. The expression on Ben’s face instantly calms her. It’s effort, focus. He gives her a centered breath and then releases her wrist. For a few moments, she is not sure what he has done at all. She feels off-balance, heated, like she could scream or cry. Her wrist burns cold where he had gripped her. As she rubs at it, Rey feels power. He’d passed her some of his Force-energy, in return for what she expended healing him. Despite the impassive face below her, she knows it's a ‘thank you’ of sorts, one that makes her wary.

  
  


She moves back, puts space between them as he comes to sit, resting an arm on his bent knee. There is hair covering his eyes and Rey fights almost unbearable urge to push it back for him. She scoots a little further away and he does it himself, gloved fingers patting bloodied hair into place.

  
  


“Why?” he asks her, jerking a thumb toward his healed ribs. He’s watching her, dipping his head as if to encourage her.

  
  


Rey doesn't answer. The truth is, she is only now coming to her senses. She is horrified with herself, despite knowing she would do the exact same thing again if she had to. She is shaking her head but he won't stop looking at her and there is not enough oxygen in this atmosphere to take a deep breath so she can't focus. He asks her again.

“Why, Rey?”

  
  


“I don't know.”

  
  


He drops his chin and shifts one leg as if he is about to move toward her. Rey's whole body stiffens. When he pushes to his knees, she is somehow closer to him than she'd thought. She could reach out an arm and touch him. Ben extends both hands down in front of him, palms up and fingers loose. It takes a few glances before she understands he isn’t surrendering, he’s asking her if this is what she wanted. It’s another wordless way of talking that feels somehow just as intimate as when he shared his thoughts.

  
  


“I don't have any restraints,” she tells him and the lack of oxygen in the atmosphere makes her sound breathless.

  
  


His eyes drop to her mouth and back, a flicker.

  
  


“I'll try to restrain myself, then.”

  
  


Is that a smirk? Rey comes to her senses fast. She stands over him, reaching for her saber. There's no weapon at his side but it must be in the wreckage and he could call it to him whenever he wants. He doesn't rise, just looks up at her with his hands in his lap. He'd appear almost docile if he wasn't looking at her _that_ way.

  
  


“Why are you here, Rey? Why didn't you just let me die?”

  
  


“I said, I don't know,” she forces the words from taut lips and ignites her saber, “Stand up, I'm taking you to your mother.”

  
  


All trace of his smirk is wiped from his face. His saber is in his hand faster than she'd have believed possible. Staggering away from him, she adopts a defensive stance but he simply stands there, blade angled to the side, and tips his head to indicate a point over her shoulder.

  
  


“I'm not going back,” his voice is soft, resigned, “and if we don't kill that thing, neither are you.” A high-pitched, stuttering squall tears through the silent landscape, setting her teeth on edge.

  
  


Later, she will wonder what possessed her to turn her back to Ben’s open blade, to search the horizon for the creature making that terrible noise. Before she has a chance to think about it, he comes to stand in front of her, partially blocking her view of the largest flying monster Rey has ever seen in real life. It's swooping toward them, but they have time yet before it reaches them.

  
  


“What is it?” she asks, nudging his upper arm with her shoulder as she brings herself to his side, leaning forward in Soresu to mirror him.

  
  


He glances at her for a split second, eyes raking her posture as if reviewing it, then turns back to the beast’s approach.

“Mynock, largest I’ve ever seen,” he speaks without taking his eyes of the creature, “Its only vulnerable spot is below the jaw. Stay still until it's close, then slide under it. We'll get one chance so don't get eaten... I can't heal you if you do.” His jaw is ticking. Rey watches it, fascinated, until he shifts a shoulder uncomfortably and flicks her a quick, irritated look. His annoyance immediately quells the fluttering of fear in her stomach and she alters her stance to a more offensive posture. This has the disadvantage of not being able to see his reaction when she responds.

  
  


“Don't _you_ get eaten... I might have learned my lesson on healing you.”

  
  


“Well, at least I taught you something.”

  
  


Rey would have shot him an incredulous look but the Mynock changes course suddenly, rearing back above them. It swipes its tail close enough that Rey has to lean back to avoid the massive leathery span of bone. Faster than she can follow, it swoops high, twists in the air and approaches them from behind, using its tails to bat again so they both have to jump away to avoid it.

  
  


“Why isn't it trying to eat us?” she calls to Ben over the swell of the creature's high-pitched shrieking. He doesn't answer. He's moving, subtly, further away from her, eyes on the Mynock as it circles them with a contact screech that rattles her teeth. As she watches, he slowly points his saber at his destroyed ship and speaks directly into her mind. Handy, she thinks, in a fight where the sound of your enemy is deafening. She can feel his smug satisfaction at her thoughts, echoing between them.

  
  


_Split the hyperdrive and run._

  
  


He raises his lightsaber above his head, waving it and his off-hand to catch the Mynocks attention. He bounds away from her and Rey turns on her heel, racing toward the smoking wreckage. She jumps over it, spinning in the air to lance through the already damaged component. It will fail in seconds.

  
  


When she lands on the other side, she can't see Ben. But the Mynock is following high and spirals suddenly to swoop at the earth, so he must be close. She watches the hyperdrive warp from white to blue, smoking pale vapor into the air on all sides of it. The element is throbbing, bulging the metal like a ticking pulse. Any second now, it will blow. Her panic is seeping into the Bond and she can’t hold it back. _Where is he?_

  
  


Ben vault's the wreckage with the jaws of the Mynock open impossibly wide behind him. He drops to the ground and races toward her, looking angrier than Rey has ever seen him. She is still standing there, mute and frozen in place, when the belly of the beast sweeps over the destroyed ship and the hyperdrive implodes.

  
  


Ben launches himself at her, knocking her to the ground and curling his body over hers so she can't see the resulting detonation. His arms are caged around her head, his face pressed to the side of hers so his breath is harsh in her ear. When the shockwave hits them, it throws them along the rocky ground, spinning them against it. Shards of stone nick her skin and the hot, chemical stench steals her breath. She can only hear the shrill note of ear-drum damage.

  
  


Ben's arm is trapped beneath her head, the other is pressed to her spine, crushing her into his chest. Dust from the planet's surface is making them both cough but Rey can only feel the vibration of their bodies, her ears still ringing. When the tremors have settled, Ben pulls back to look at her, searching her face.

  
  


_Are you hurt?_

  
  


She shakes her head, watching him, feeling all the places their bodies are touching in this awkward position she has found herself in.

  
  


_I told you to run._

  
  


She frowns at him, _I did run._

  
  


He raises one eyebrow in a way that instantly makes her think of Leia. _Out of the blast range would have been preferable._

  
  


She doesn't have any reply to that deadpan voice in her head. She knew the blast range, she'd turned to _make sure he made it_. He pulls back a little more, eyes roving as if he can read what she is thinking in the tremble of her lip. Rey can feel the heat in her cheeks as she realises he’s heard her stray thought.

  
  


_Ah, I see._

  
  


She curses at him out loud and straining, but neither of them has recovered their hearing. Instead, Rey struggles out of his protective embrace. For a moment, she thinks he might not let her go. His fingers tighten on her arm. She smells the spicy scent of whatever cologne he uses under the dust and leather and sweat.

  
  


It's the same cologne he'd had on that night, three sleeps cycles after Crait. It’s enough to bring it back to her, on this barren planet a million parsecs from where they were then. He'd knelt by her berth, one arm tentatively clutching the frame as she heaved silent sobs into the pillow. Later, she would curse the Force for bringing him to her the very moment her anger had turned to hurt.

  
  


_Why wasn’t I enough for you?_

  
  


She'd screamed at him, heartbroken and careful to keep quiet in the packed bunker. He’d leaned back in shock, wincing at the pitch of her voice in his head. She hadn’t noticed his eyes were swollen until he’d spoken, quiet with barely restrained anger.

  
  


_Why wasn’t I?_

  
  


She pushes away from him now. There is nothing for her here but it’s so hard to remember that when he’s so close, so real. Ben lets her go and shuffles back to his knees to turn a full circle, scanning the horizon. The back of his body is entirely covered in blue blood and gloopy blobs of flesh that fall away as he moves. Like a flash, the wisp of her rage is snipped. She almost laughs. Ben senses her humour and gives her another irritated look that draws an actual snort from her. She’s suddenly quite glad of the tinnitus that masks the sound from him.

  
  


When she moves to sit, sharp pain sparks through her leg. She grasps blindly at it, sucking air through her teeth, and feels the jut of a stray bone fragment impaled above her knee on her inner thigh. Ben scrambles back to her. As her hearing returns, she can make out the sound of his panic, though the words are muffled. He reaches for her leg, bats her hands away and eases her knee to the side so he can inspect it.

  
  


He is cursing. In several languages.

  
  


_It's fine, there's a med-pack on my ship._

  
  


In response, Ben’s worried eyes dart to hers and then to her X-Wing. It's in ruins, the cockpit blasted open and burning, one wing listing to the ground. As she watches, the landing gear collapses and the ship drops to the earth in a cloud of dust and smoke.

  
  


Rey is cursing. In several languages.

  
  


When he looks back to her, she can see it in the rapid movement of the small muscle under his eye, in the way he can’t settle his gaze but keeps flitting between her eyes, the way he opens his mouth to say something but nothing will come. She doesn’t need the Bond to know he’s cycling through every potential ending for this. The mostly likely outcome is that she will bleed out. That would leave Ben alone to die in some other way, another Mynock attack or simple starvation. There is the slim possibility of the Resistance finding them, if they search hard enough, but that could take days and she won’t last that long. If they find Kylo Ren hovering over the dead body of the last Jedi, there’s no amount of skill with a lightsaber that could prevent Finn and Poe from killing him. It’s impossible, but the best option for both their survival is the First Order returning to search for Ben once the Resistance has cleared the area. But again, that will take days.

  
  


Hours. She’s got hours. That’s not enough time.

  
  


Ben comes to the same conclusion. She sees the moment he rejects it. His face hardens, as if denial is a viable option. Rey finds herself smiling because this explains quite a bit about Ben, but he doesn’t see her reaction. He is preoccupied with pulling off a glove and pressing gently around the wound, trying to figure out how deep the shard is embedded, focusing only on the problem right in front of him. It takes every drop of strength Rey has left not to cry out when the bone fragment moves. A small pool of her blood has formed on the dirt beneath her leg and the set of Ben’s shoulders tells her what she already knows. He is hunched over her, staring at the injury, won’t meet her eye as he speaks.

  
  


“It’s bad, Rey. I can’t remove it. You’ll bleed out if I do.”

  
  


She can hear him now, though the tinny echo is still there. She nods, accepting, but he is still not looking at her. Without warning, he rears back and pulls his tunic over his head in a jerking motion. Beneath the outer layer, his soft, clean undershirt rucks up to reveal his stomach before falling back down. Rey looks away, a blush rising over her skin. There is no way Ben didn’t hear the scramble of her thoughts. In her peripheral vision, he has stopped moving, watching her, and she braces for a sarcastic comment.

  
  


It doesn't come, and his mind is suspiciously quiet when he takes the undershirt off and begins to rip the material into strips. She’s still not looking, studying the desolate landscape for any sign of danger. But she can only crane her neck so far and the expanse of his pale, bare chest draws her eye again and again. His movements are short and efficient and the shirt is in shreds in moments. When he’s done, he shuffles closer, gently lifting her foot and caging it between his elbow and ribs. Her knee is bent at an angle but the pain lessens with the elevation.

  
  


Rey looks back to him when he nudges her uninjured leg to the side and inches forward to sit between them. He is studying the wound again and the skin at his clavicle is noticeably flushed. But when he looks at her, there is no trace of emotion, just a hard, worried stare. He hands her his glove and Rey takes it with a questioning frown.

  
  


“This will hurt. Bite down on it.”

  
  


Rey’s eyes widen. “You want me to put your glove in my mouth?”

  
  


The flush on Ben's chest instantly reaches his face and he whips his gaze back to her bloodied thigh. He is squeezing her ankle with his arm but she can tell he doesn’t know he’s doing it.

  
  


“It’s that or crack your teeth,” he says shortly and sets to work on stopping the blood flow.

  
  


The first makeshift bandage shifts the bone and sears through her torn flesh like fire. She shrieks and twists, pulling away from him but Ben doesn’t falter, just wraps his hands around her hips and draws her to back him. The soft underside of her injured thigh rests against his knee. He shifts so his shin holds her free leg in place with a pressure just shy of pain. It’s something to focus on, to ground her, and now she can’t move even if she wanted to. One less thing to worry about. Without comment, he continues to wrap the material in a figure of eight around the bone fragment. He is careful, methodical, focused. Rey can watch him without fear that his gaze will divert to her. She uses him as a centerpoint and lengthens her breathing, trying to pull out of the pain with meditation. It’s not all that effective. Her thigh feels hot where it touches him. Her hips tingle where he’d gripped them. Her breath is too short to access the calm she needs.

Once the bandage is in place, Ben lowers her foot to the ground, resting a hand on top of her knee to keep it in place. His mind is still quiet but he’s frowning at the ground between her legs and she finds herself wishing she could see what she is thinking. He looks up and leans forward, reaching for the hand she is using to prop herself up. Rey can’t help but freeze in place, eyes glued to his face as he stretches over her. When he takes his glove from her hand, he has to tug a little before she looses it and there is a wobble of doubt in the blank wall of his expression. It’s gone in a flash, replaced with a steady determination. Instead of moving away, Ben rests his weight on the hand that holds the glove and angles his face toward hers. His breath is shallow.

  
  


Logically, Rey knows her reaction should be to scoot away from him, to edge herself out from beneath his hunched form and put as much distance as she can between them. But that is not what she does. Instead, her body tenses. Her hips angle as if to allow him more space and she doesn’t even flinch when he cups her jaw. His palm is warm, rough and so large that his bloodied fingers rest on the back of her neck while his thumb presses gently at the side of her mouth. It’s a comforting weight and it takes some restraint not to lean into it.

  
  


_That will hold it for a while, but you don’t have long. We have to get you off this rock._

  
  


“How?” In this thick atmosphere, she sounds like she is exhaling instead of speaking. He is so close now that her breath moves his hair. He’s inched forward again, without her noticing. There is a charge between them, foreign but still so familiar that Rey feels its liquid pull deep in her belly. The pain is forgotten. She can’t seem to feel anything but his touch.

  
  


“Why are you here, Rey? Why didn’t you just let me die.”

  
  


She blinks at the pleading desperation in his voice and answers without thinking, like his tight stare has somehow hypnotised her. She can’t stop the words that come from her, can’t even think them through or understand where they have come from at all. It doesn’t matter now anyway, she only has hours.

  
  


_Because it’s you._

  
  


It’s true, she thinks, as he closes his eyes. She couldn’t have turned and left him here alone to die in this isolated place. It’s not that she felt guilt, or any emotion. It was instinct to dive toward him, instant and overpowering. She might not fully understand it, but she knows the tug of his presence, the feel of his Force-energy, the mess of his mind and the overwhelming draw of his body to hers. No matter how angry she is, how hard she wants to fight it, she can’t pretend it’s not there, not when his position in every battle forms the basis of her own maneuvers.

  
  


Rey isn’t ready when he opens his eyes again. She isn’t prepared for the relief, for the heat and the pain she finds there. But still, she cannot move away. Her chin tilts toward his of it’s own accord and the press of his knee against her uninjured thigh feels like a jolt of static as he dips his mouth hers. He is agonizingly slow, staring at her face as if watching for any sign of distress. Too slow, it seems, because it’s Rey that bridges the distance between them, reveling in the glimpse of surprise in his eyes before she closes hers.

  
  


And then she is kissing him and her world is spinning and fading until there is nothing but his breath and his tongue and the plushness of his lower lip between her teeth and the short, dazed sound that comes from him as she reaches her free hand into his hair. It’s instinct again, and Rey is following it without question, chasing it, because there isn’t anything left to lose.

  
  


Ben recovers quickly from his disoriented state and surges higher over her. She almost smiles as he asserts himself, pulling back to angle his face so he can deepen the kiss. His fingers tighten on her, thumb pulling at her lip so the trembling peel of her breath releases into the air. She tugs his hair in response, like this is a battle and she needs to gain the upper hand. But Ben isn’t thinking like that at all. She keeps catching snippets of his thoughts, images of her face, the line of her body, the desperate longing and the tinge of guilty images that she knows he has imagined because he has never seen those parts of her. He’s feeling them now though, as his hand drops from her face to slide over her breast. He squeezes and the sensation shoots straight down her body like a current. She rips away to gasp at the sky above them and he goes rigid, hand frozen in place, body tensed so tightly the air crackles.

  
  


Rey focuses on the dirty, grey cloud-cover, breathing hard. She can hear him trying desperately to control his own breath as he lifts his hand away from her body. Before she has collected herself, Ben reaches out in a swift, sharp motion. It’s only when she feels the pressure at her shoulder that she realises what he has done.

  
  


She had forgotten she was wearing it. It was a part of her uniform that she hadn’t needed in their dogfight in the black above them, nor back at base. Her personal comm. Ben had activated it. She wonders when he spotted it. How long he’s been deciding what he would do. What moment it was when he concluded her life was more important than his freedom.

  
  


He sits back as Poe’s voice grates in her ear.

  
  


“I’ve got her, Finn! Rey? Do you copy? We have your coordinates. We’re coming for you. Stay where you are.”

  
  


She doesn't answer. She can’t. She’s too focused on Ben, pulling his filthy tunic over his head, shrugging himself into it. When he's clothed, he sits on the ground with an expression like thunder, eyes flicking from the wound in her thigh to the skies, watching for his enemy’s approach. He hunches in on himself and there is something boyish in the clench of his mouth that makes her want to soothe him.

  
  


She doesn’t. She doesn’t speak at all. She doesn’t even ask him why.

  
  


She already knows the answer.

  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Thanks so much for reading!
> 
> As usual, huge appreciation to RedRoseWhite for her beta'ing prowess and for making me join Reylo Twitter (please come say hi @denzerwriter) and to SymmetryLocked for such a great song choice!!


End file.
